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“But we could bet on it for later.”
We could. I rolled the cigarette between my fingers before I took another drag. My eyes watered and I sputtered another cough. When she reached over to pat my back in sympathy, I turned my face to blow the smoke away from her.
“What are the stakes?” If we were going to bet on anything, we needed to have stakes.
“What do you want?”
I stared at her, then reached over with my free hand to tuck an errant tendril of her hair behind her ear. The tilt of her head, the dark length of her hair—even pulled back into the ponytail—appeared to have grown so much longer over the last year. That was what hair did, obviously, even though it fell nearly to her ass at this point.
No answer seemed to come easily to me. If anything, all I wanted was this moment. “More moments like this.”
Confusion filled her eyes. “Just hanging out with me?”
“I like hanging out with you.” Loved hanging out with her. Boo-Boo didn’t mind it when I was quiet. She laughed at my jokes. She let me have my little lies when I needed them. When I wanted more…
I wanted more.
Holy shit, I really did want more. I wanted to make her smile and I wanted her to be proud of me. I wanted…I wanted to be the person she needed. I wanted to take the risks she took…
“I haven’t forgotten about our date,” she promised. “I’m actually excited about it.”
“Might be a bit,” I grumbled.
“I can wait.”
“What if I don’t want to?” The irritation was immediate, but I winced because I didn’t want to lash out at her.
“Then don’t,” she countered, leaning back and pulling her legs up to sit crisscross in the chair. “We can be creative.”
Creative?
“What? Do our date here?”
At the Clubhouse? With the guys? I mean, I liked the guys, but… I wanted to take Boo-Boo out. Like when Jasper and I took her to the movies. Granted, I invited myself on their date.
“Why not? I mean—we have rooms that we don’t use.”
I frowned.
“We have my studio—”
Scratching my jaw, I turned that idea over.
“There’s the warehouse itself. If we get rid of the rats, we could probably play laser tag out there or something…”
I snickered.
“There’s the pool table and darts…”
She was offering up so many excellent suggestions.
“We also have that huge sofa in the suite and a television.”
“That all seems kind of… boring for a date, Boo-Boo. I want it to be special for you.”
Head tilted, she smiled. “It will be special, because it’s with you.”
That squeezed all of the air out of my lungs. I crushed out the cigarette. “I don’t know if I’m worth that much.”
